Recently, some ‘objectionable’ text has been omitted from the
curriculum of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa by the Provincial Government , succumbing to pressure of their
major alliance, Jamaat-i-Islami.

Four chapters on Holy Prophet and his wives have been
omitted from one of the text books, to replace them with some new chapters, namely one on Raja Ranjeet Singh and others.
Some concepts like Christmas cake and the Holy Cross were introduced to kids at
different places.

20% of this countries’ population consist of various minority
groups. However, our text books seem to cater to the needs of Muslim students
mostly. Despite a sizable population of minorities, majority of our students
are not acquainted with understanding of religious rights and norms of minorities. In
most of the schools, non-Muslim students have to study compulsory subject of
‘Islamiyat.’ No wonder, why are we witnessing a drastic increase in religious
violence, mob attacks on minorities and forced conversions of non-Muslims. Polemic
arguments with non-Muslims are common practices, at most of the workplaces and
education institutions.

With a compulsory subject of Islamiyat, can’t we not use the
space in other text books to introduce some non-Muslim heroes? Or get our
children acquainted with some non-Muslim practices? So that our next generation
doesn’t look their non-Muslim Pakistani brothers with contempt, and are able to
respect them as any citizen of Pakistan should be respected - with equal rights
to practice their religious norms and take pride in them.

The second thing, that I found quite shocking, was the
omission of pictures of minor girls without head scarves from text books. Do we
need to remind these maulvis that head scarves are not compulsory in Islam for minor
girls? Which version of Islam are they following really? For they seem more to
resonate with centuries’ old ‘pashtoonwali’ and conservatism of FATA region,
instead of religion.

How can a political party, that doesn’t even enjoy the
full mandate of Pashtuns of Khyber Pakhtunkhawa, enforce their self righteous,
conservative traditions on the other less conservative sections of society?

About Me

A media and communication specialist by profession, I love
to write in my free time. Writing feels similar to eating,
breathing or sleeping. I have a thing for social
issues, particularly human rights.

Warning: dark humour may be one of my specialities.

The opinions expressed in this blog are personal, and do not represent any organisation.